"Remoted" - Day 165 (Friday)

It was roots-visiting day back in the ‘Burg with a meetup with dancers from the studio we all danced at in high school, and for some, for many years afterward. There are several dancers who have been meeting weekly for years to keep alive the dances we learned as teens. When I moved back from Tennessee and was staying at Mom’s in Fitchburg, I dropped in occasionally, but once I started working it was a lot harder to make it to daytime dance meetups.

Dancing at the pavilion is great!

Today, my vacation day finally coincided with group dance day at the open-air pavilion at Saima Park. The stars and planets also aligned for my sister to be there. There were seven of us running through Merce Cunningham and Denishawn warmup and centerwork followed by a Denishawn and Marion Rice Studio repertoire. 

If you’ve ever heard of muscle memory and wondered if is a real thing, I’m here to tell you it most definitely is. Sometimes it just took hearing a few notes of the music for steps and entire chunks of dances to come right back. It was tricky being on concrete in rubber soled shoes and not on a wood studio floor in dance slippers or barefoot, but we managed. The turns are the hardest because rubber doesn’t quite glide on concrete, and I can’t find my leather soled jazz flats which might have worked better. 

That pavilion concrete was flat and pretty and the space is large. While dancing, I was also thinking how nice it would be to roller skate there. The outdoor setting was breezy and perfect, and we even did one dance out on the grass. 

It felt great to move, although I fully expect to be lame from neck to toes tomorrow after not having danced, moved, or even gone for a walk since, I dunno, April. How long is that, now? For the past month or so, at the end of each day my butt is in actual pain from sitting all day at the cute but ergonomically deficient desk chair, and then all night on the futon that should have been replaced by a proper adult sofa at least three years ago, but shit happens. Or in this case, doesn’t happen.

Veggie straws and wine kind of night.

After the dancing, there was a pizza lunch (Espresso!) with Mom at my sister’s house. Later, Mom and I went to Big Lots, but nobody else was interested. Apparently, she and I are the only ones in the family who go there for recreational purposes which probably speaks volumes about the excitement levels in our worlds. We each got a few things and then headed to our respective homes in opposite directions. I am now stocked with toilet paper for months and granola bars for at least a few weeks. The veggie straws may not last to see tomorrow. They are delicious, but like eating air. Perfect with wine, but what isn't?

Overall, it was a great day. Culture, nature, family, salty snacks and wine. I give it an A.